High Performance Thin Layer Chromatographic Determination of Colchicine in Pharmaceutical Preparations and Biological Fluids

A simple and rapid high performance thin layer chromatographic (HPTLC) method was developed for the assay of colchicine in bulk drug, pharmaceutical preparations and biological fluids. The method has a linear range of 4 35 μg/ml. The limits of detection and quantification were 1 and 4 μg/ml respectively. The results obtained by the proposed method were compared statistically by means of Student t-test and by the F-test with those of the reported method. The two were shown in good agreement. No interference was observed from common pharmaceutical excipients. INTRODUCTION: Colchicine is a natural toxic alkaloid of Colchicum genera from Liliaceae family and is found in Colchicum autumnale. Colchicine is obtained from the corm and seeds of the meadow saffron and other colchicum species. It is mainly used for the treatment of acute gouty and arthritis and for the prophylaxis of the acute attacks. The treatment of acute gouty arthritis is relatively well cured by the use of colchicines as anti-inflammatory agent to urate crystals. The mechanism is not well known and may be due to several actions (inhibition of leucocytes mobility and activity) 1 . Colchicine also inhibits cellular mitosis by binding to tubulin and is used in the treatment of cancer. It has also been used for the treatment of amyloid deposition in familial Mediterranean fever and primary biliary cirrhosis 2 . QUICK RESPONSE CODE DOI: 10.13040/IJPSR.0975-8232.4(7).2737-41 Article can be accessed online on: www.ijpsr.com The most frequent adverse effects of oral colchicine are those involving the gastrointestinal tract and may be associated with its antimitotic action 2 . Symptoms of toxicity occur after several hours and are commonly nausea, vomiting and diarrhoea. Multiple organ failure, haemorrhage, bone marrow depression, muscle damage, respiratory distress and myocardial injury are observed after overdose. Death may be due to respiratory depression, cardiovascular collapse or bone marrow depression 2 . Consequently, standard and selective analytical protocol is a must, for the quantification of colchicine in the biological samples and pharmaceutical dosage forms for the purposes of quality control and more significantly for the clinical diagnosis. Literature survey reveals that many analytical methods are reported for determination of colchicine 3-10 . The techniques used for measurement of the selected drugs such as HPLC-MS, LC-ESI-MS and GC-MS, all require highly sophisticated instruments which are relatively expensive and hence are not always available.